This learning sequence investigates the controversy surrounding the Three Gorges Dam and the impact it has had on the Chinese people and environment. Students explore the use of infographics, maps and websites to convey information and opinion and design their own infographic to communicate their understanding of the human and environmental impacts of the Three Gorges Dam.

Key inquiry questions

What impact has the Three Gorges Dam had on the people and the environment?

What are the most significant human and environmental impacts of the Three Gorges Dam?

How can information be visually presented to effectively communicate your ideas?

OI.2 Interrelationships between humans and the diverse environments in Asia shape the region and have global implications.

Students develop knowledge about the Three Gorges Dam project and how the damming of the Yangtze River has impacted on the environment and people living on its banks.

This learning sequence provides opportunities for students to develop the Australian Curriculum general capability of Intercultural understanding by developing informed attitudes and values by making judgements and decisions that ask them to consider their own values, position, and that of others.

Acknowledgements

Three Gorges Dam in focus

Infographic about the Three Gorges dam

About the Three Gorges Dam

Since it was first envisioned in 1919, damming the Yangtze River at Three Gorges was seen as a way to tame the mighty Yangtze River, which periodically overflowed its banks resulting in devastating floods. Another potentially positive outcome was the power supply that could be provided by a hydro-electric dam.

However, building such a dam has also long been a source of controversy with many voices raised against the idea. In 1992, the National People's Congress approved construction of the dam but almost one third of delegates voted against or abstained from the vote.

Construction began in 1994 with the dam becoming fully operational in 2012. The Three Gorges Dam is the world's largest power station and the Chinese government naturally regards completion of such a massive construction project as a historic and engineering success. However, the social, economic and environmental effects have not all been so successful. It is widely accepted that over one million people had to be relocated from the towns and villages upstream that were submerged as the reservoir filled. The international community has also protested the loss to human heritage of the centuries-old settlements that are now far below the water line.

Environmentally, government officials have acknowledged massive landslides along the river upstream of the dam. Water seeps into the riverbanks and destabilises the land, making landslides more likely. Furthermore, less rain and increased drought have plagued the region since the reservoir was filled. Many caution about the catastrophe that could follow an earthquake as the dam sits along two known fault lines.

Activity 2: Yangtze before and after 1987-2006

In this activity you will assess the impact of Three Gorges Dam through use of a NASA-generated visualisation to show what the Yangtze River was like before and after the dam was built.

Key inquiry question: What are the most significant human and environmental impacts of the Three Gorges Dam?

Impact of damming on people and the environment

View the NASA visualisation, created from satellite images showing the Yangtze River before and after construction of the Three Gorges Dam, and read the information.

Imagine what impact the dam would have on people living upstream and list three impacts the dam might have.

Find the Three Gorges Dam on Google Maps. Use the Yangtze River Basin map to help you locate it. Once you have located the dam in Google maps, zoom in, switch between map and satellite views so you get a sense of its impact on the local area.

On the Google map there is a satellite feature with a drop down menu in the upper right hand corner. Select 'photos' in the menu for more images.

Zoom in and view at least five photos around the Yangtze River and the Three Gorges Dam.

Drag the map upstream and hover over at least ten photos looking for details that show the impact of the dam upstream. You might see images of landslides, industries like mining, and villages as well as landscape scenery taken by tourists.

Make a list with two columns: one headed 'Impact on people' and the other 'Impact on the environment'.

Read the NASA Earth Observatory article on the Three Gorges Dam which includes still satellite images of the dam. Add any new facts about the impact of the dam to the list you created at the beginning.

List two impacts that NASA says the dam has had on the environment and two on the people.

Raise two questions each for what you'd like to learn more about the following topics:

the dam's impact on the Chinese people

the dam's impact on the environment.

Skim the article Environmental and social issues of the Three Gorges Dam. It was written to analyse the potential of the dam to lead to conflict and is for an academic audience but, by skimming the article, you will learn about some of the main impacts the dam has had on the Chinese people and the environment.

Add information about the impacts to your lists.

Re-read the article, and look for information that fits into the appropriate column.

Add the information to your table by writing down or copying/pasting the information into the correct column.

More

Rise of the Three Gorges Dam – a three-part animation that documents the rise of the dam, including several photographs giving a bird's eye view, from the NASA website.

The Landsat Program – information about the Landsat satellites, which collect information about earth from space, from the NASA website.

Before and after

NASA satellite images showing the Yangtze River before and after the dam construction

The Yangtze River: 1987 vs 2006

Among the many programmes that make up the NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) organisation, one is the Landsat Program.

'The Landsat Program is a series of earth-observing satellite missions jointly managed by NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey. Since 1972, Landsat satellites have collected information about earth from space. This science, known as remote sensing, has matured with the Landsat Program.Landsat satellites have taken specialised digital photographs of earth's continents and surrounding coastal regions for over four decades, enabling people to study many aspects of our planet and to evaluate the dynamic changes caused by both natural processes and human practices.'

Of particular interest for this resource is Landsat's cataloguing of images related to the Three Gorges Dam. In the article, Rise of the Three Gorges Dam, NASA states that the Three Gorges Dam is 'One of the few man-made structures so enormous that it's actually visible to the naked eye from space'.

Observations from the NASA-built Landsat satellites provide an overview of the dam's construction. The earliest data set, from 1987, shows the region prior to start of construction. By 2000, construction along each riverbank was underway, but sediment-filled water still flowed through a narrow channel near the river's south bank. The 2004 data shows development of the main wall and the partial filling of the reservoir, including numerous side canyons. By mid-2006, construction of the main wall was completed and a reservoir more than two miles (three kilometres) across had filled just upstream of the dam.

With this featured resource NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio has created an animated visualisation where the camera flies in to the region from outer space, zooming in on the Yangtze River as it appears according to 2006 data showing the high water levels that have already filled the multiple gorges upstream. The animation then transitions to the river at pre-dam 1987 before placing the dam and showing the upstream reservoir filling. The visualisation concludes with a split screen view allowing direct comparison between the 1987 and 2006 upstream levels, clearly depicting the flooding of the Yangtze's riverbanks and many adjacent valleys.

Activity 3: Creating your own infographic

In this activity, you will create an infographic to focus your opinion on what you think everyone should know about this topic. You will select new information and present your ideas effectively.

Create an infographic

Review what you already know.

Look through your notes, especially the columns focused on the impacts of the Three Gorges Dam on people and the environment.

Start to give shape to your knowledge bank of facts by clustering them into a mindmap. Scan your notes and create groups of information so you can see just by the size of the branch of a cluster how important that topic is. For example, do you have lots of facts about the lost heritage in the submerged villages and little on landslide?

Check all your notes from the previous activities for anything else you might want to include.

Gather more information. What you already know is a good start but, as you begin to create your infographic, you will find that you need more information to be persuasive.

Look for words that jump out at you because you already know something about them.

Study the work of an Australian graphic artist who created one of the most popular infographics available online. Jane Genovese is renowned for her posters on the environment. One of them is an infographic on the impacts of global warming (on the right).

Look carefully at how Genovese uses colour, shapes and facts to engage you.

Analyse the main opinion communicated by the graphic.

Review your cluster and use it as a guide for your own colourful infographic.

Acknowledgements

Illustrating impacts

Infographics

Infographic is short for information graphic which is the visual representation of information, data or knowledge that is thought to better present complex information quickly and clearly.

An effective infographic can quickly grab a viewer's attention, making further analysis an option that would not have existed without the initial visual appeal.

As for the featured resource, it is created by the person responsible for one of the early viral and republished infographics. Jane Genovese gained attention for her graphic Solving Global Warming – Doing Something.

Activity 4: Reflection

You have come a long way from considering building projects in your own local area to travelling back in time to the China of 1987 before construction began on the Three Gorges Dam.

You have explored in depth the impact this massive dam has had on both people and the environment.

Finally, you tapped into your artistic and design abilities to communicate your understanding and opinions with others.

Reflect on what you have learned about China and the environment.

Consider how you have learned to gather information and present new knowledge through infographics.

You can engage in open reflection or complete the prompt, 'I used to think… but now I think…'

In this learning sequence, students use infographics, maps and websites to gain a deeper understanding of the human and environmental impacts of the Three Gorges Dam.

Students observe how infographics are used to convey persuasive arguments by reducing complex information to more readily comprehensible key facts and comparisons. Students create their own infographic to demonstrate their understanding of the human and environmental impacts of the Three Gorges Dam.

Activity 1: Dam the river, watch the impact

Students are asked to reflect on large construction projects in their own area. This sensitises them to the human and environmental impacts any large building project will have. Students examine a simple infographic that show's how to reduce text and increase understanding by using comparisons (e.g the length of the reservoir would take 5.7 days to walk).

Infographic interpreting data about the Three Gorges DamThree Gorges Dam – infographic on Flickr reduces text and uses images in an effort to engage viewers and inspire further learning.

Activity 2: Yangtze before and after

Exploration of the topic is initiated through use of a NASA-generated visualisation which gives students a birds-eye view before and after completion of the Three Gorges Dam. This provides a context and intuitive sense of the dam's impact before turning to Google Satellite and Maps views of the area where they are coached to virtually explore the terrain and photos that people have posted. The 'show photos' feature of Google Maps may be unknown to students but it reveals both postcard-perfect landscapes as well as landslides and devastated villages.

Video animationNASA visualisation – NASA-generated visualisation that shows before and after views of the Yangtze River near Three Gorges. Students are asked to imagine the impacts on both people and environment.

Activity 3: Creating an infographic

Once students have acquired solid data, the inquiry process shifts to a creative synthesis phase. Students refer to numerous examples of infographics showing the impacts of global warming.

Activity 4: Reflection

Finally, students reflect on what they have learned. It will be interesting to see how many of the students were able to make a significant connection between their feelings about the impacts of local building projects with the impact Chinese people may have experienced.

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